Final Blog/Presentation Post

 

    America is a special place. It’s a country known for its opportunities for a better and more financial stable life. In America you can be anything you want to be without rejection; and you may serve whatever God or not as you will. Living in America, you get the privilege of living amongst different people who come from different cultures. However, with the pros, their always come the cons. 

    I, a white female being brought up in an upper middle class white town, have never witnessed poverty or financially unstable areas. I do not know what it’s like to be on the other side of the fence. However, this class helped me gain perspective by trying to put me in the shoes of what it was like to live life in America back then.

To Sir, with Love

Julia smedira

December 11, 2023

 To Sir, with Love 

    “To Sir, with Love” is a 1967 movie, set in the swinging sixties, about a black man named Mark Thackeray. He was born in the English Guyana, with a poor and simple background, he wants to become an engineer however jobs are scarce; so, he accepts to work at a job teaching, to replace a colleague who has left school, in the East End which is a rough London neighborhood. 

    Mr. Thackeray ends up teaching high school, for a class of all white, poor, rambunctious, and totally undisciplined group of students. With no experience as a teacher, and having no control in the classroom, he quickly learns that his students need a different kind of education rather than a textbook. With only a few weeks before graduation, he decides to teach discipline and respect.

    Mr. Thackeray’s experience in teaching a group of unmanageable, hopeless students, forces him to take charge of an unpleasant situation. He has lots of difficulties approaching them, the students not only have little interest in school but are not quite ready to be taught by a black man. Causing him to show the students that he will not tolerate disobedience. Mr. Thackeray realizes he has a lot of work cut out for him.

    Determined to make some difference in the students’ lives Mr. Thackeray demands the students call him "Sir". This is because he is a man of polite manners, who values respect. He treats his students like adults and has discussions with them about things they have questions on, showing the kids what being an adult is all about.

    Through the course of the term, his students learn to respect others, themselves, and him. Even more his students realize they do have bright futures if they remember what Mr. Thackeray taught them. The process by which he molds these rebellious teens into mature and thoughtful adults was his goal from the start. It’s the type of characteristics and actions you show, that determine your character in the end.